Football Culture Is Still Luxury Fashion’s Sharpest Reference
At London Fashion Week, Simone Rocha debuted her first adidas collaboration – a quiet but powerful reminder that football culture remains a foundational re
At London Fashion Week, Simone Rocha debuted her first adidas collaboration – a quiet but powerful reminder that football culture remains a foundational reference for luxury fashion. The collection moved beyond nostalgia and gimmicks, reworking utilitarian match-day staples through Rocha’s romantic lens.
Simone Rocha’s Adidas Collaboration
The Irish designer sent her debut adidas line down the runway, offering a subtle yet deliberate take on football’s influence. Track tops were sliced with sheer panels and threaded with ribbon lacing. Polo shirts carried classic match-day silhouettes but were softened with lace trims and sculptural volume. Classic adidas footwear received the signature Rocha treatment.
What set the collection apart was its lack of irony. Football can easily become costume when translated into high fashion – as seen during the Y2K era – but Rocha treated the track top, one of modern dress’s most potent and emotionally charged garments, with the care usually reserved for couture.
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Designers Building in This Space
Rocha’s work is merely a reminder, not a novelty. Designers such as Grace Wales Bonner and Martine Rose have long anchored their practices in football culture.
Grace Wales Bonner – Her ongoing partnership with adidas explores terrace style and diasporic football histories, producing pieces that feel like artefacts from a parallel football archive.
Martine Rose – She has consistently understood British football culture as social fabric. Oversized jerseys, referee shirts, and awkwardly brilliant silhouettes echo Sunday league touchlines and 90s warm-up kits – further reinforced by her collaborations with Nike.
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Club Collaborations and Creative Directors
Collabs between clubs and high-end fashion houses have redefined what merchandise means. Louis Vuitton and Off-White have entered football-adjacent territory. Moncler linked with Inter, Patta with Barcelona, Aries and New Balance reworked AS Roma, and Balenciaga turned its attention to Stade Rennais.
On the world stage, NIGO – during his tenure at KENZO and his work with Human Made – took time to design Japan’s national team jerseys for the 2022 World Cup. It felt symbolic: one of streetwear’s most influential figures shaping how a country presents itself through football.
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Even clubs are evolving. Crystal Palace made history as the first Premier League side to appoint an in-house creative director to oversee off-field collections and future fashion partnerships – a move that goes far beyond merch strategy.
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A Cultural Anchor Beyond Seasons
The lineage stretches further: Stella McCartney’s work with adidas around Arsenal, the late Virgil Abloh’s football-inflected collections, and the way Stone Island and CP Company moved from terrace staples to luxury mainstays without shedding their football DNA (notably CP Company’s partnership with Manchester City).
In short, football is more than a seasonal reference – it is a cultural anchor. For those operating in this overlap daily, none of this is surprising. But seeing Simone Rocha put it front and centre at London Fashion Week served as a timely reminder to the wider industry.
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